Question: If the environment doesn’t convince me that bestowal is good and enjoyable, I will never achieve it. However, on the other hand, if I don’t seek bestowal, the environment won’t desire it. How do we break free from this vicious circle?

Answer: We should agree to play a game with each other. Rabash writes about it in his articles about the group and its purpose. Nobody arrived here with a ready-made desire to unite with the others, but we decided that we wished to act that way.

You are complaining that it’s impossible to advance without desire, but if you did have it, you would advance egoistically, in this material world. However, how do you advance transcending this egoistic desire? You need to rise above it, and that is why we make a pact in our environment that we value bestowal above reception.

We understand how it works in theory, but in reality we don’t feel it. Hence, we need to play the game of bestowal which is described as, “I labored and found.” We pretend that the goal is extremely important to us, even though in truth we don’t see any importance in it. We are not deceiving ourselves. We admit it, but say that it doesn’t bother us.

I am immersed in my egoism in this world, but in order to raise myself to the next rung, to ascend into the upper world, I play this game with the friends as if it is vitally important for us to reach this future world, the degree of Bina, love and bestowal. If everyone before me pretends that it is important, I will accept is as truth. Otherwise, we will remain in our ego forever. If I don’t force values upon myself that are more exalted than the ones I have today and don’t accept them above reason, I will never achieve them.

If the environment constantly plays like this for me, this game will eventually become my second nature. However, you don’t want to play it. Instead, do you wish to remain “honest,” without corrupting your heart? Since there is nothing else in the heart except egoism, that’s where you will be stuck!

Yes, I admit that there is only egoism in my heart, but I pretend in order to be above it. I can’t order my heart to feel differently, but I wish to receive a new heart, a different one. Now, I act as if I don’t have this egoistic heart, as if I stepped out of it and started to treat everything solely with bestowal.

I rise above everything I have within. There is some savage being living inside me with whom I don’t wish to deal anymore. Let him suffer there inside me, but I, myself, am moving into another system, another body. The environment will affect me and so will the upper Light. However, I have to pressure myself so I may come to it! I don’t want to hear any arguments; I don’t let such people even come close to me.

We must agree that all of us together are sort of playing, working, for each other. If I don’t do my duty, I weaken everybody, and the harm that returns to me increases manifold. Therefore, I should not fear to meet the conditions of mutual guarantee; otherwise, I will suffer immensely. Arvut (mutual guarantee) is a horrible weapon, a double-edged sword.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/10/10, Baal HaSulam, Letter No.13

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Question: Sages said that we should expect salvation from the Creator every day, but how do I keep this hype up so as to always feel as if I am about to get a revelation and not let go?

Answer: You should make this anticipation pleasant. A person can think about pleasant things all the time. However, if you get tired of thinking about it, it means you don’t take pleasure in it.

We are made of the desire to enjoy, and if we are enjoying something, we strive for it. If not, we try to get rid of it. Hence, we should do our best to make our thoughts about the revelation of the Creator and the spiritual world sweet and delightful. Then, we won’t be able to stop thinking about it.

I have to constantly tell myself that it brings a fulfillment that will compensate for everything I lack. It will satiate all my desires, hunger, thirst, and exhaustion. Spiritual revelation is the answer to everything. Then, I won’t forget about it, but always desire it instead. This thought will constantly haunt me in the background of everything else.

If thinking about spirituality is a heavy duty for me, it will certainly take a tremendous effort. However, it isn’t a job. It has to be enjoyable, like a “salve for an exhausted soul.”

After all, you have never before felt the love of friends as a sweet spiritual fulfillment. You simply enjoyed spending time with them. However, imagine that it will bring you to some very exalted, incredibly enjoyable, and fulfilling experience, to an indescribable feeling of peacefulness that you have never felt before, as if you were in tranquil, gentle waters, and then you will start yearning for it.

Obviously, for now, it is an egoistic aspiration, Lo Lishma (not for Her Name), and you simply seek pleasure. However, it still will allow you remain in this thought and, simultaneously, you will start discerning truth and lies, advancing thereby.
[32800]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/10/10, Baal HaSulam, Letter No.13

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Question: Why do such notions as unity and mutual guarantee seem to us as flat and lacking any volume?

Answer: This is incorrect. Unity and mutual guarantee are corrections which connect us within the system. They contain Partzufim and Sefirot, worlds and Lights, but we do not see them.

For example, what does unity mean? We are opposite, repelling and hating one another, but we have to rise above our desire and unite in similarity, pushing away our differences. Every one of us has a point which is capable of uniting with others. We connect these points and try to increase their quantity and quality.

In this process we annul ourselves and above it, we reveal our connection and mutual guarantee. We want to create space between these points, but by what means? We create that space by adding Aviut (coarseness) to them because there should be something from Pharaoh.

We treat desires of the still, vegetative, and animate levels as a kind of necessity, but we work with the rest of the desires by connecting them with the points. Being connected with the points, these desires pass Aviut to them and create a place where the revelation occurs.

Then, desires which oppose unity increase, and this causes friction and arguments between the points. Some of them do not want to be together, and others attempt to take control. We have to work with these desires. At first, we have to restrict them, but later, we have to attach them to the points.

Then, the work in three lines begins. We constantly reinforce our unity and, together, we build a place where the system of the worlds and the Creator become revealed. Hence, on top of that dimension, the notions of unity and mutual guarantee include the entire reality, including this world.
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From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/10/2010, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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Writings of Rabash, Shlavei HaSulam, “What Does It Mean that the Blessing Does Not Dwell Upon Something Which Is Accounted in the Work”
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The Book of Zohar — Introduction: “Two Points,” 74-124, Item 120Lesson 1
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Talmud Eser Sefirot 3, Part 8, Item 62, Lesson 37
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Writings of Baal HaSulam “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Lesson 3
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The only thing we lack are anti-egoistic screens (Masach). The desire itself does not change. It only becomes revealed for being used to the degree of the screen that it has.

The screen determines what desire you can use, how much, and in what way. Therefore, we already have everything besides the screen—it is the only thing we need!

The screen is the force to overcome my egoism in spite of my egoistic desire, despite the things that seem attractive, sweet, completely obvious and rational, and are confirmed by my entire mind! Yet I go and do the opposite!

And I don’t just do the opposite, turning a minus to a plus. That would be very simple. Rather, I am in no way guided by my desire, logic, or any of my calculations. There is only one calculation for me: “This is the desire of the Upper One!”

I don’t receive anything at all from this, and don’t desire to receive anything. I want to know just one thing: that this is the desire of the upper one. This is called a “screen”—the force enabling me to act this way, above my desire, above nature, above egoism and all of its calculations.

And there is great pleasure contained in this. This is not masochism from enjoying trampling my desire, but pleasure from the fact that this makes me similar to the Upper One in some way.

It’s like a child who desires to be similar to an adult. This is a natural instinct children have. They have to make great efforts to achieve this, even though nature helps them.

The upper nature has endowed children with this enormous gift, enabling them to grow. It gave the will to enjoy such a powerful thrust that it forces it to work very hard, never stopping to rest. Look at how little children act, running about non-stop and doing something all the time.

This is the pure upper force, the force of bestowal, the force of the Creator, which is present in small children and in any creature that desires to grow. They do this against their nature because our nature aspires to rest! We can see this from all the laws of physics: Everything aspires to a restful, motionless, and balanced state. The laws of entropy, conservation of energy are aimed at this.

Yet in the case of children we see how the body does not let them take a break. A child is always running about, eager to do something, and it is impossible to stop him. In our days this phenomena is called “hyperactivity,” but in fact it isn’t “hyper” activity, but normal behavior for the increased will to enjoy that is being revealed in the last generation. For such a developed desire, this is not an exaggeration, but the norm.

It’s a wonder looking at what children do; they are anti-nature. We have simply gotten used to the picture where children know no rest and that’s why we aren’t surprised by it. But where does this body or desire take this moving force, causing him to run around this way?

This is the regular picture, inherent in any creature. An adult mother, such as a dog or a lioness, is lazy, sleepy, lying down, sleeping, sitting calmly, and wishing to rest. And all around her there are cubs whirling about and never tiring. This is the opposite nature. And man behaves the same way.

This aspiration is given to children from above, against nature, in order for them to develop. Likewise, we have to ask for this force in order for us to spiritually develop!
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/24/11, Talmud Eser Sefirot

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Question: What can we do now to make the Creator happy?

Answer: Everything I do in the aspiration to unite with others in order to thereby give the Creator an opportunity to bestow to us—all of that means giving Him pleasure, even if I still haven’t attained the kind of unity inside of which He could bring His abundance.

Unification has to be total. Our Kli divides into five parts, and into five more, and so on until the 125th part. This is the smallest degree of unity between everyone, and it is already sufficient in order for the Creator to give us the corresponding dose of His Light, which we will feel.

Therefore, our entire work lies in preparing the Kli, the vessel in the unification among us. We shouldn’t work in relation to the Creator, but among us aspiring toward Him. Unlike Soviet Russia, we don’t unite for the sake of ourselves, but in order to give the Creator an opportunity to bestow to us. Then Israel, the Torah, and the Creator will really be one.

And that is enough. We work among us, keeping an intention to benefit the Creator, in order to prepare the vessels for His bestowal.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/24/11, Writings of Rabash

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Question: Do I have to look for suffering on the spiritual path, or on the contrary, avoid it?

Answer: You should never think about suffering. If a person feels suffering, he has to know that to the degree he feels the bad sensations, he is being controlled by impurity, Klipa.

That’s because suffering does not come from the Creator. He is good and does good. Everything I feel comes from Him, even though it seems to me that I am being influenced from different directions. Thus, if my sensations are opposite to goodness, if they are unpleasant and bad, that means I am ruled by Klipa, egoistic desire, to the same measure. It neutralizes the Creator’s good influence, turning it from Light to darkness. That is why I feel bad.

Thus, the bad sensation is meant to show me how much I am immersed in evil. This has to push me to turn my sensation to goodness. And if I am in the right environment, then I can immediately achieve this. The group’s support prompts me to immediately change the bad sensation to a good one.
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/24/11, Writings of Rabash

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Question: Does the Creator hear the plea of a person who is asking to raise him to the next degree because he wants to avoid pain?

Answer: Certainly! The Creator hears any prayer. Just ask! But don’t bother Him on trifles as the regular "folks on the street" do. We see that those prayers remained unanswered: People have been begging in vain for millennia.

However, if you wish to rise to the next degree from your present egoistic state, from your egoistic will to enjoy, from all the conditions set for you by the Creator, which are not up to you, and you beg to ascend, the Creator immediately hears and gradually transforms you.

Obviously, you beg from your egoistic desire in an attempt to escape suffering, have power, be recognized, and so on. Yet it doesn’t matter what goals you place before yourself. If you always ask for a higher spiritual degree and visualize it in your mind, in your egoistic desire, in a certain albeit false way for now, then it is called “Lo Lishma (not for Her name),” and thereby you advance.
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From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/23/2011, “Introduction of The Book of Zohar,” Article “The Donkey Driver”

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Question: There are two principles: “faith above reason” and “judge only according to what you see.” Don’t they contradict each other?

Answer: A person only needs to judge according to what he sees. This means that I must check everything in accordance with criteria subject to verification and analysis.

Faith above reason is a degree of bestowal, which I precisely measure over my receiving desires. To believe above reason does not mean to have my head in the clouds. We measure and organize the quality of faith according to the property of reception being revealed. In my effort to rise above it, I make precise measurements; this is my only accurate test. And then, I acquire faith above reason to the extent of my success with turning reception into bestowal.

Suppose that I checked and calculated that I am able to turn 20% of my receiving Kli (vessel, desire) into bestowal. I perform a restriction over the entire 100% of my Kli, and I’m only able to utilize 20% from reception into bestowal. Thus, I precisely verify and calculate this action.

Knowledge helps construct faith above reason. And this is why there can be nothing unmeasured in it, nothing unseen by me, which would prevent me from making a precise judgment.

We simply do not understand that the property of bestowal can only appear from opposites. The receiving vessels turn into bestowal through very diligent work and meticulously regulated, specific efforts. Moreover, measurements here are even more precise than in the actual vessels. This is because I measure and test their resistance, which costs me a lot of effort.

When doing this, my efforts are 620 times more precise than when receiving. When I receive, I simply “open my mouth,” but in order to bestow, I need to check my desire and the desire of another, compare all the data, and perform many different actions.

This is specifically why the property of bestowal represents the limit of accuracy, whereas the property of reception exists without any control in us and is left to its own devices.
[33219]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/2011, “The Matter of Tu Bishvat”

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Question: Is there a margin when patience on the spiritual path begins to cause harm?

Answer: “Patience” does not mean that I sit and let the grass grow under my feet. It is written: “A fool sits on his hands and eats his heart out.” “Patience” means that I constantly, non-stop, try to attain unity.

I keep discovering time after time that I am very far from it, and I keep trying. I fall off again, and once again I return to the path; I keep climbing the mountain as I am being pushed down, over and over again. The higher I get, the less merciful the “guards” become, but I still do not give up.

I only care for my perseverance: I persistently perform a correct evaluation of my actions; I persistently grab on to the goal every second; I am adamant in my decision to attain it. I have nothing in life but this.

And as a consequence of my perseverance, my comprehension of evil and good, my understanding of the purpose of creation constantly changes. I keep getting inspired, as I keep revealing something new in it. Whatever I saw yesterday as bestowal, the Creator, and the evil today acquire new, completely different shapes. In this way, perseverance constantly renews my inner definitions, my connection.
[33222]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/20/2011, “The Matter of Tu Bishvat”

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